The beginning of the full-scale invasion was a tragedy, but also a moment of exceptional resilience and commitment. The stories in the series are inspired by the citizens who stayed in the capital in February-March 2022. All of them are ordinary people who happen to be in overwhelming and terrible conditions, but who retain their humanity, love for those close to them, and faith in the future.
The series will debut on November 1st on Netflix in Ukraine and several European countries, including Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, and Moldova, as well as in the Baltic and Balkan regions.
The series also will be shown on national TV channels in over 12 countries, including Iceland, Australia, and France. YLE TV channel (Finland) will be the first to air it on October 29th. The project will also be shown on 1+1 TV channel in Ukraine next year.
“'Those Who Stayed' is the largest co-production with other countries since February 2022. It is the first Ukrainian project ordered by foreign channels that will be shown in Ukrainian,” says Kateryna Vyshnevska, a producer and the Development and Co-Production Director at FILM.UA Group.
Swedish (SVT), Norwegian (NRK), and Finnish (YLE) TV channels joined Film.Ua Group as co-producers in the first stages of developing the series. The global distributor of "Those Who Stayed" is the German company Red Arrow Studios International, with whom the project was developed.
"Those Who Stayed" is an anthology of six stories by six filmmakers who were united by an idea created by the series showrunner Anastasiia Lodkina. Talented Ukrainian artists joined the project: Oleksii Esakov and Tala Prystaietska, who worked on the series "Love in Chains"; Artem Lytvynenko, creator and director of the series "The Sniffer"; Valentyn Shpakov, creator of "Early Swallow"; and Pavlo Ostrikov, creator of "You Are Space." The project was the very first major work for Katia Tsaryk, creator of numerous music videos, concerts, and the short film "Hug Me."
Each episode of "Those Who Stayed" is a short film inspired by real events, and the characters sometimes have real-life prototypes. Olha is living in a house with her children and both her current and ex-husbands. Maksym is unable to leave the zoo where he works due to the war. A homeless man, living in a car, assists the local theater, while a boy named Yehor calms himself by imagining shooting down missiles as if they are evil birds. German Klaus travels to Kyiv to pick up his girlfriend but ends up joining volunteers. Meanwhile, a Ukrainian pop legend, inspired by Andrii Danylko, streams from his apartment in the capital and inspires millions of people.
“Ukraine is now at the center of the world's attention, which is why foreign audiences are interested in learning what is happening to us not just from the news, but on a deeper level. The format of the fiction series allows for a deeper understanding of our pain and hopes. It also helps to relate to the feelings of ordinary Ukrainians,” says Anna Eliseeva, producer of the project.
The project has already been supported by leading festivals, in particular TV Drama Vision, Helsinki Script, Conecta FICTION, Nordic Script, Content Budapest, Serial Killer, Oslo Series Day.
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